Slashdot Mirror
EA Sports to Kick Off Fantasy Football Website
loid_void writes "Reuters reports that EA Sports, best known for its market-leading sports video games, 'said on Wednesday it would offer paid online fantasy football for the upcoming football season. Players will be able to join a 'public league' set up by EA Sports and sports information provider STATS Inc., or use EA's online system to track their own league of up to 32 'team owners' starting July 21, a company spokeswoman said. The EA Sports Fantasy Football site sets up personalized home pages for each league to monitor real-time scores and statistics, the company said. The cost to play will be $9.99 for the public league and $99.99 for private leagues, the company said.'" Seems like the service will be similar to the well-known Yahoo! Fantasy Football website, sponsored by EA last year.
I RTFA in hope of understanding it better, but I still don't get one thing: How do the matches get played/decided? Do they match numbers and throw out a result or do you have to play Madden online or what?
Currently it seems to be some kind of MMO football manager, I never knew sports management sims had a large market in the US...
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
you and your league mates take turns at the beginning of the real football season "drafting" players to fill your roster. You'll select actual players from the various positions (qb, rb, wr, etc.) and place them in your roster. Then each week, during the real football games, you get points for your team based on the player's real life performance. Depending on how the fantasy league is set up, you either have head to head competition (where you compare your weekly score with another team to decide who wins), or you just tally points all season long and the winner is the one with the most overall points. It has nothing to do with any EA sports game...
Sports News for nerds.... Isn't that like Military Intellegence?
Well, the pricing is fairly standard (good) and considering that most use Stats Inc., they can only add more perks to separate themselves from the rest of the pack. 32 teams in the Commissioner package is definitely a major perk. It makes for a much more deep, competitive game.
However, the League Manager package is coming up short since it doesn't look like it will let you run your own. Now, you might be asking if that is the same as asking for the Commissioner package for the $10 price. It is not. In most services, you can create your own league and invite people who paid the same fee as you (well, sometimes with extra fees for extra teams) and make your league public or private. The Commissioner package offers more control over how the league runs and is meant for use with your friends or coworkers. But, the ability to create your own public or private league and run it to an extent is normally standard in a package like League Manager. EA needs to recognize this shortcoming and fix it, otherwise they're taking a big dent out of their potential subscriber base.
Other than that, things look pretty normal. The prizes could be a little bit better and money leagues would be nice as well, but their name should carry them far.
On another note, an idea that would be cool (perhaps a new perk for Xbox Live gamers since it'd be hard to pull off on the PS2 as well) would be the ability to take your fantasy team and get to play it in Madden. That is assuming that they lump the defense and special teams guys (except kicker) together and they make the offensive line be determined by your quarterback. Their stat tracking has to stay very up to date as well. Anyways, have the teams clearly marked as fantasy teams and give the gamers special Xbox Live tournaments where they can duke it out with other people's fantasy teams for prizes. The link between their fantasy football packages and the video game would probably get people buying both just for that feature alone.
Until Slashdot fixes the funny modifier, use insightful or interesting. The poster knows your intentions.
I am a very avid gamer and I love fantasy football. I play EA games all the time, especially the Madden series. I do not really see a market for this kind of thing. I have done real fantasy football for about five years now and I do not see any personal enjoyment out of doing a fantasy league based on online gaming.
I personally do fantasy football because it allows me to get more enjoyment in watching football games on TV that do not involve my home team. Basically, if there is a game on TV, chances are there is a player on one of those two teams that will effect the outcome of my fantasy match-up that week, hence a reason to get into the game. With that said, I would get no enjoyment watching others play Madden 2004. I would rather just play myself.
I couldn't think of anything witty to say, so...you're stuck with this.
There is really good free football game. That sound like little like that. You shoud have a look . I have played it sometime and I'm loving it.
After reading the clueless replies above, I have to respond as a guy who plays in at least 3 FFL a year.
The model they are trying is simply not going to work. $100 or $10 per person isn't going to fly. They should either try the Yahoo model, free to play charge for premium services, or like fanball, start for free then start charging per year. I don't see how the synergy between Madden is going to work. I play Madden. I never go to the Madden website. How would I see that a FFL is even offered. Why would I switch? The Fantasy Football market is huge. I put in at least $100 a year into it. (Guides, website fees, & prize pot) But they are just too late to market.
I can get a league going at Real Time Sports for $10 cheaper than $99 and they actually have some years experience under their belt. rtsports and yahoo are both pretty good sites so EA had better have something pretty good to offer. I think their best strategy is to bundle discounts with their Madden line of games.
I do think this is a good idea for the person who is interested in fantasy football and doesn't have a group to join, but I'm curious how they'll work such public leagues. There are only so many players in the NFL to choose from.
I'd also love to see something like this in MVP '05 (being in the Boston area I'm a big baseball fan), although I can see EA not necessarily wanting to invest human resources in something that bold on a less popular franchise.
Either way, this sort of functionality is very exciting and I think we can look forward to a lot of it as the next generation of consoles approaches.
This pricing scheme seems rediculous. The only way I can see this making sense is if it works like this;
a)You pay $9.99 and get to draft a team in a public league
or
b)You pay $99.99 to set up a private league, and once set up the individuals who join the league join for free.
This makes sense, as it would encourage groups of people to set up private leagues with EA as opposed to ESPN where teams are around $30, but can play in either a private or public league.
How is it different than Yahoo!'s offering? Why would I switch? Yahoo! works and without a compelling feature to make it worthwhile to switch, no one I know will.
What would make it worthwhile (as I've said to all my fantasy buddies who would listen) is for someone to sign a deal with TiVo to integrate their services together. If a fantasy service allowed me to watch football games and see fantasy updates on my TV without having to check my laptop, I would definitely switch.
"Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos!"